Mark Lenz: Your survey answers affect news coverage

News, by nature, is unpredictable. You never know exactly what to expect when the phone rings on a Saturday morning.

This particular Saturday morning, it was a report of the standoff at a west Adrian home that appears on the front page of today's paper.

By the time I got to the office, Telegram staff already were working on the story. Photographer Lad Strayer was on the scene. Co-workers in our circulation department knew of witnesses. Erik Gable and David Frownfelder covered the site early, and photographer Mike Dickie took a shift. David Panian, our news editor, helped us throughout the day with online posts, and then took over producing the print product. Everyone worked together to help cover a tense situation.

Far more importantly, some good law enforcement officers worked together and utilized excellent equipment to arrest the suspect. Saturday's standoff on Renfrew Avenue ended with no injuries — except for a badly wounded bomb squad robotic vehicle. Give them kudos. Give the robot a Purple Heart and lots of replacement parts.

Other news items tend toward the more predictable:

An unbelievable amount of media coverage tonight will focus on how actresses dress for the Academy Awards presentation.Washington will wait until the last possible minute on any fiscal deadline, then usually kick the can further down the road.TV network news will devote countless hours to a shooting involving a South African Olympic athlete and his model girlfriend, while pretty much ignoring dozens of shootings taking place every weekend in cities like Chicago.There's not much more you can do with these, but here's something about which you can have a voice.

Local news.

What do you like better? College sports or high school? Photos or writing? City hearings or investigative reports? Efforts to produce video online, or more pages of printed content? What sort of balance do you prefer? Would you pay more to get more? What changes would you make?

Do you prefer "Beetle Bailey" or "Pickles"?

These are the sorts of questions you can help have a say in. We're recruiting an online survey panel through our parent company. Even after 120 years, we at the Telegram are serious about our original slogan: "A paper for the people."

So, take the introductory survey at http://GateHousePanel.com/DailyTelegram.

Because you may not know what news awaits you tomorrow, but you can have a say in how we at the Telegram work together to report it.

Mark Lenz, editor of The Daily Telegram, can be contacted at 265-5111, ext. 230, or via email at mlenz@lenconnect.com.